Principal songwriter and lead singer Xavier Serrano claims the record is about the “process of an individual who is facing an existential awakening through the death of a relationship” but even if its concept might be left cryptic behind the curtain of its organics, one can’t help but feel a strange sense of lost and unease that pervades the record.

Opener “Whitney Lake Sorrow” immediately sets the tone with its weeping strings and overwhelming lament: “So you live instead of die, What do expect to defy, who’s your alibi?” Serrano pleads not to dwell on the stagnation of being lost in one’s negative thoughts, but on first single and standout, “Arrow”, that ominous ennui returns: “Days go by like an arrow, / I wonder if it’ll go far. / Leave me there in the shadows / I wonder if I’ll ever find light.”

Perhaps surprisingly, one of the most appealing elements of Kindred Queer’s music is how alive it sounds. Kindred Queer has had years to perform around the New Haven area before finally getting to recording some studio cuts, and these extra years of refining really shows. Every song comes off as deftly arranged but effortlessly performed, the whole band gliding through its own songs like a leaf through an unnavigable path in some forbidden catacombs in search of ancient wisdom,

You can purchase Kindred Queer’s Child EP here. Listen to it below or on Spotify here.